Observations on economics, the academy, the wider world, and things that run on rails.

7.4.16

BE CONSIDERATE OF THE NEXT PATRON. FLUSH AFTER USING.

In the grand scheme of things, the fact that the use of public privies becomes a major skirmish of the culture wars serves as a reminder that, despite the slow economic recovery, the presence of unassimilable migrants in Western Europe and the United States, and the propensity of Illinoisans to serve bratwursts with yellow mustard, we've got it pretty good. Here's Reason's Steve Chapman suggesting that there's already a lot of crossing going on in the loo.

[T]ransgender men generally go unnoticed in men's restrooms, for the simple reason that they appear to be men. In fact, the odds are very good that at one time or another, you have unwittingly done your business alongside someone who is transgender—with no ill effects.

There are deeper policy questions, involving the state of knowledge in abnormal psychology, that aren't so easily dealt with. Privacy, transgressiveness, live-and-let-live, get-out-of-my-face.

[T]he traditional norm for people with gender dysphoria has been to deny, suppress or hide their true nature—so that everyone else could operate in comfortable denial.

The traditional norm these people could expect if they were found out has been hostile and often violent.

It is not to that I wish to speak. Rather, there's an instructive passage in a Northern Star article about repurposing the one-stall restrooms (and there are more than a few, even at a large university) as available to anybody. (Be considerate of the next patron.)

Molly Holmes, director of the Gender and Sexuality Resource Center, said she has been pushing for gender-inclusive restrooms. The Gender and Sexuality Resource Center has a gender-inclusive restroom, located on the first floor, that can be accessed by anyone regardless of their gender identity.

“I think it’s better to call them gender-inclusive because they’re not necessarily for [non-binary] people, but say that a dad needs to take his daughter to the restroom and he can now just do that without having to go home,” Holmes said.

It's likely that the case of the dad with a tender-age daughter, or the mom with a tender-age son, comes up a lot more frequently as an awkward situation in the loo than the presence of a crosser. For the present, those will be the one-seaters. The multiple-seaters will take more thought.